California Trembles

California, that vast empire known the world over for its sun and its gold, for its beaches, Google, the Golden Gate Bridge, Sonoma wines and Hollywood, is thinking about breaking up. The mere mention of this makes Washington shudder. There is fear that the epidemic will spread. They don’t forget that California is the land where all trends originate; here they say “Jump!” and the rest of the country asks, “Please, sell me new exercise clothes for jumping.” (And this last phrase is not mine; it’s Bill Maher’s.)

A venture capitalist from Silicon Valley, Tim Draper, inventor of Skype and a Bush donor, has just received the OK to begin collecting signatures for his Six Californias plan, as the secretary of state’s office has confirmed. Draper needs over 807,000 registered voter signatures before next July 18 so that his proposal can be taken to the polls in November. According to Draper, 38 million Californians are too many and too diverse to be well-represented in government; Six Californias would be something else, more refreshing. “We’re simply too big and bloated.”

The world’s eighth largest economy, the most populated state in North America, will attempt to split into six geographical regions:

South California would include San Diego, Irvine and Riverside, and a strip of land from the coastline to the border with Arizona.

West California would keep Hollywood, Santa Barbara and Montecito, that is, from Los Angeles to San Luis Obispo running along the coastline.

Central California would get the desert region including Bakersfield, Fresno and Stockton up to the border with Nevada.

Silicon Valley, with the name of the technology valley, would cover the Monterey area, San Jose and San Francisco.

North California would be very small, with the capital of the current California, Sacramento, as its only large city.

Finally, Jefferson would be in the north and would get the cities of Chico, Redding and Eureka up to the border with Oregon.

Draper, whose Atherton house would make him a resident of Silicon Valley, which if California split up would immediately become the richest state in the U.S., thinks that the split would benefit everyone: “The strongest argument for Six Californias is that we are not well-represented. The people down south are very concerned with things like immigration law and the people way up north are frustrated by taxation without representation. And the people in coastal California are frustrated because of water rights.” However, North California would become the poorest state in the country. Draper thinks his plan encourages regional cooperation and creating a new structure that will improve governability.

The idea of splitting California up is not new; since its founding in 1859, residents have tried to divide it on several occasions with proposals that suggested two, three or four states. In any case, the probability of California becoming six states is low because even if voters ask for it at the polls, the U.S. Congress would have to approve it, add 10 more senators and five stars to the flag — implications with political repercussions that would be felt in Washington like an earthquake. California starts to tremble again.